The Black Hat
by hajikurazaki19
Summary: Zexion is sitting at his computer when one day, a hacker tries-and succeeds-to lift his most secretive files. Now, he is on a search to find out who would DARE impede on his craft.
1. The Ultimate Sin

**Hey all! Haji here with an experimental story and such. I don't have time to chat, so I hope you enjoy. It's about Zexion. (surprise surprise)**

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><p>He was sitting there. Just sitting. Sipping on his favorite soft drink even though he knew it would eventually rot his teeth, even though he despised the taste of Dr. Pepper at six o'clock in the morning, even though he was dog-ear tired, irritated, and lonely. He was just sitting there; awakened by the sound of his computer on the fritz.<p>

"What the fuck?"

His dark hair painted a mottled slate from the glow of three or four screens around him, his grey eyes drawing in the numbers flying through his system like a slightly agitated sea sponge, lips twitching into a snarl, Zexion was both impressed and infuriated at the fact that his computer system was being destroyed right before his very eyes. As the numbers and codes flew by with a renewed burst of energy, Zexion sighed, and sipped the Dr. Pepper he despised drinking at six in the morning.

He knew he couldn't do anything. By the time he had been fully awake, and had realized that he was being hacked, it was too late to begin any reverse coding to trap the intruder out. The intruder was in already, and Zexion couldn't risk doing anything against him until he could figure out what he wanted. As soon as the coding slowed by the smallest margin, Zexion placed his drink on a table behind him, cracked his fingers and lashed back at the hacker with a twisted grin on his face and a barrage of coding that even the most advanced web-weavers would scratch their heads over.

Instantly, the threat backed off.

Zexion was surprised by the retreat at first. How peculiar that such an aggravated and intelligent foe would just back off like a newbie. That was script-kiddie stuff. Or a really clever tactic.

Unfortunately for Zexion, as soon as his curiosity got the better of him for the first time in his life, he was locked out of his own system, all his files were dumped into the trash can, and his trash can was zipped up and extracted by the same intelligent foe.

His whole life, his identity, everything that defined him. Lost. Stolen.

And the only thing that was left was a very unattractive, ogre-faced gray hat dancing around his screens, singing a song.

_Loser, loser, double-loser. Fist, fist, kiss this._

And a shiny red ass flashed on his screen, and remained that way until Zexion ripped the power supply to his computers out of the socket and rebooted. Upon reboot, his screens were black and unemotional. Permanently destroyed beyond repair.

It was now time to build a new computer.

And to figure out who the fuck that brazen, intelligent, asshole was.

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><p>"Ah, Zexion!"<p>

Zexion opened the door to his preferred computer store, which was just about to enter the throes and woes of bankruptcy, grumbling to himself. The clerk, who was an old (unwanted) friend of his, Demyx, was leaning over the counter polishing the glass of the display case that housed a whole host of different drivers, naked USB ports and stripped computer jewels—like RAM chips, and AVID dongles.

"What brings my favorite best friend to a computer store?"

Zexion pursed his lips. "Your sarcasm is duly noted." He searched the shelves with slightly bloodshot blue eyes. "I need to build a new computer."

"Why?"

"Because I do."

Demyx slithered off the counter, disappeared into a back room, and reemerged with a handful of magazines. "Well, I just got all the latest catalogs. I saw some good stuff in here. You might be interested."

"I'm looking for speed." Zexion paused. "Lots of speed, and processing power so I can move a lot of information all at once."

"Well, what's more important?"

Zexion frowned. That was a good question. To him, both were important. Very important, and in the computer world, it was hard to decide. Speed was important for loading and unloading everything. RAM was just as important, as was compressing, reorganizing, launching and—most of all—exterminating. He couldn't have it all, not all at once. He needed to take it in steps, even though he had the means to secure the funds for his project.

Demyx didn't know he could hack computers. Though he was sure Demyx assumed he could, just because all computer literate people knew how to hack computers, just like all self-publishers could write, and all housewives could compete in international cooking competitions. Zexion didn't think telling his unwanted best friend about his "ability" would make the dire situation he was in any better. In fact, it would probably make it worse. The last thing he needed was a blog post about his concerns, then his foe would try to get his goat again.

"I need power," Zexion said. "The best of the best for everything. I don't care how much it costs. And I want it by next week."

Demyx frowned. "Are you sure? You do know that's like..."

He disappeared behind his counter again through the back room. Zexion could vaguely hear the clacking of keys and the crunching of numbers. After a few minutes, Demyx returned with a long roll of slightly coiled paper. He shoved it under Zexion's nose and huffed.

"I'll be able to have a beautiful new computer for you, ready next week, for about five grand," Demyx paused, obviously for a dramatic effect that didn't go over so well, "minimum. It'll keep rising until you have a powerhouse monster. All by next week. I promise. However, I'll kind of need it now."

Zexion arched an eyebrow. "I can wire transfer it to you. But, I'm not walking in here with five thousand dollars in cash. I'm not an idiot."

"I wouldn't rob you, you're my best friend," Demyx said, offended.

Zexion snorted. "I'm not worried about you. I'm worried about the idiots outside this store. I'll transfer it to you tomorrow. I have to call my credit union."

Demyx nodded. "Sure, okay, I'll put the order in to one of my best builders, m'kay? He'll make something beautiful, just for you. And then you can fix whatever you don't like. I don't see any reason you have to build it entirely from scratch. Let me take care of it."

"Demyx, do you even know what you're talking about?"

"Sure I do," Demyx assured. "I can read, you know."

"Whatever. I'll have my credit union contact your bank."

Demyx nodded vigorously and grinned. "Well, then, movie night tonight?"

Zexion shrugged. "I'll think about it. I'm not feeling anything right now."

Demyx sighed. "I know a pirate."

Zexion scoffed. "That's illegal, you know." He looked in the glass display case. "And so are those dongles."

"Illegal, scmi-legal." Demyx waved him off. "What are you even doing in here, huh? I don't know you."

Demyx kindly, but firmly pushed Zexion out the door and closed it behind him. Zexion heard the distinct click of the lock, and Demyx flipped the "Open" sign to "Closed" and drew the curtains faster than anyone had time to think about it being suspicious (which is was). Zexion frowned and turned on his heels, thinking of only one thing. That intelligent and brazen asshole.

The one who dared to step into HIS territory, steal HIS life, challenge HIS authority. Oh, how payback would be a bitch. A great fat one with a terrible taste in music.

However, he was five grand short and didn't have the time to draw upon one of the bank accounts he had set himself up with a long time ago for emergencies. So, he had to start from the bottom with a year old laptop he kept hidden away. It was time for war. Mano a mano.

For, you see, Zexion was an elite hacker. One of the best. And some ass just pissed him off...big time.

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><p><strong>Yeah, so I'm experimenting with my writing style again. This is preparation for that something big I may have mentioned.<strong>

**Hope you liked it.**

**Has a nice day. :D**


	2. TBIA

**Good morning, all. Haji here with another chapter of this idea that just popped into my head on my way home from school. Isn't it lovely when you get so suddenly inspired for no good reason? I love it so much. Fatherhood was the same way.**

**And I think I really like the Zexion Demyx dynamic. Not for the yaoi. I'm not a hugely huge fan of the yaoi even though I wrote one and that makes me a hypocrite. But they are like polar opposites that just work so well together as a friendship. That's just me being honest.**

**More honesty right now: I don't actually like yaoi all that much. To me, it's kind of weird. I mean, I know I wrote one. But it wasn't mindless, pointless sex. Seriously. It was tasteful, and I didn't mean for it to happen that way. It just did. I mean, haven't you ever been writing one day, and then the plotline goes somewhere completely different in a way that you hadn't been intending so you just roll with it? Get off my back! /endrant/**

**Sorry. I got a little carried away. It was completely irrelevant.**

**Enjoy the chapter.**

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><p>When his computer arrived the very next week, just like he had requested, Zexion had this childlike giddiness about him that was most unusual for a hacker of his status. Hackers, though sometimes excitable at the possibilities of new discovery, did not get overly excited because—in the computer world, at least—things could go from fantastic to failure in just a few keystrokes. But, this was a cause for celebration. A brand new computer capable of going head to head with the United States Government was sitting in his house, ready for its new home.<p>

And what a home it was. It was small, seeing as Zexion had to appear to live within his means as an assistant IT at a local law firm. The walls were not barren, but the pictures were created with code. Plasmas of all different resolutions and cost hung on the walls in a neat organized fashion, connected to one another through hundreds and hundreds of feet of hidden wires within the drywall. Keyboards were attached to each screen, and wireless mice were strewn about the room, some broken and missing pieces, and some reformed into something out of a science-fiction novel.

Zexion, to say the least, was a wizard in his own right. Nobody knew of his secret life. In fact, many people would frown upon it if they ever found out. They would instantly assume he was an "internet troll" and then push him away more than they already did. But Zexion didn't care, he was better than them. He was better than all of them.

Except for one.

That brazen, intelligent, asshole who had intruded on his life and stole everything from him. And, armed with a new computer giant, and a grudge to match, Zexion cracked open every box of silicon, and rearranged the entire thing.

Even though the computer was built to perfection right out of the box, and Zexion would have been able to plug that fat sucker of mayhem into a socket and immediately take an offensive stab at the world, he decided that he would rather beef it up even more. After all, it was going to have to have enough power to move across multiple screens, keep track of multiple programs at top speed for several days on end without rest, and be able to protect itself where Zexion could not babysit on his own.

The first thing he did was throw as much RAM as he had into the tower. It was already bursting with it, but a few more gigabytes to top it off wouldn't hurt at all. In fact, after all the add ins, plugs, dials, switches, dongles, firewalls, widgets, installations, setups, reboots, and security tests, Zexion had himself a monster of a computer that ate his electricity bill to hell.

But it was a fortress.

"Okay, you motherfucker," Zexion whispered to himself as he sat at his monster and sipped Dr. Pepper. "Where are you?"

He had already tracked every IP address that he had been able to extract from his old computer, and they were all dead ends. That was no surprise really. But, he found a pattern within the constant redirecting, and he traced every IP address that entered every Wi-Fi Hotspot within a thousand miles of his home for the past twelve months. There were millions of numbers trailing across his screens. And it seemed that he was going nowhere fast.

That was the beauty of the computer. Even though the information may have appeared to have disappeared, it was always stored _somewhere_, even if it was in some back log of some router at an internet security company that hadn't been touched in months—but had a nice big back door wide open.

Zexion pursed his lips in annoyance. The brazen, intelligent asshole had piggy backed off an internet security company's servers. Even if Zexion had the time to sit and wait for a security check on every employee who worked there, he already knew it would be a dead end. This adversary of his was smarter than he had first recognized. Much smarter.

The only other person he knew who would pull such a risky maneuver—piggy backing off a security company's servers to jump from computer to computer throughout the world—was him. And he never told anybody his methods of doing so. So that meant the person had been watching him for some time because he never used the same method for everything, and he never used a predictable pattern.

Suddenly, he felt so vulnerable.

But, his fingers grew hot after a while and he logged into a poor unfortunate credit union's bank account managing system to figure out how to evenly distribute the five thousand dollars he had stolen from his parents. He was that good in that he had sent all the letters, emails, and automated phone calls to every person he stole from to cover the few dollars missing from their accounts. As far as they were concerned, that unpaid cell-phone bill—because everybody had at least one— was being taken from the account the companies had on file, which was a perfect reason to be missing a hundred dollars. Do that to five hundred people, all under the same company plan, and five thousand dollars (and then some) could be collected in a heartbeat. And then the five thousand was deposited back into his parent's account, and nobody was any the wiser. As for the rest? There was a nice account _somewhere_ in the Caymans for it.

Zexion then decided to wipe those bills off the credit reports of the unsuspecting victims, just to make their day.

How nice of him.

After a few hours, everything was right with the world again. Zexion had been surfing the internet mindlessly, searching for keywords to help him discover his next target. Somebody deserving of having an entire system failure. Very few fit the bill, and he was thinking about going after Facebook, like he had been dared before, but he didn't see the point in it.

He could derail the trains in Japan, just to cause a stir in their community. Japan's trains were never late because they all ran on computers. And then there would be mass panic and rumors of cyber-terrorism, and then Zexion could be drawing unwanted attention to himself. Which is something he really did not want to do.

Or he could just wait until that brazen, intelligent asshole decided to attack him again.

However, those fingers of his were getting awfully hot.

What could he steal? What would give him the most satisfaction?

Zexion's fingers hovered over his keys. As soon as the thought popped into his head, he executed it flawlessly. He was still on a mission to find out who his adversary was. And the only way he would be able to get him was to call him. And what better way to call a hacker than to paste his ogre-faced grey hat with the shiny red ass on every electronic billboard in New York City for an hour?

Then in Tokyo.

Then on every TV station that was at least connected to the internet.

Zexion thought he had over saturated the market just a little bit, but he had no idea where his adversary was. If he had incurred the wrath of a hacker, they could be anywhere in the world, which meant he had to hit as many as he could as far away as he could.

Exactly one hour after that public call, Zexion's cell-phone buzzed.

He blinked slowly, and opened a text message that had appeared on his screen. It was the ogre-faced grey hat. Just a still picture of it, and a single caption at the bottom.

_You called?_

Zexion smirked, but didn't bother to plug his phone into his computer and track the number. It was unsettlingly easy to get his adversary to contact him. A little too easy, which made it instantly feel like a trap, which instantly put Zexion on guard. He stared at his screens, fingers over his keyboard like he was about to fight.

Nothing happened for a long time. He had almost sighed in relief to know that his computer wasn't on the list of this hacker today, but after only a few seconds, the hacker's grey hat popped up on the screen, and Zexion leapt into action.

He was flying, faster than any single person should be when typing. He eyes never stopped moving, and they melded into this iridescent blur in the waves of codes, pictures, and videos that began to clog up his screens. He managed to beat the pop-ups away, and he began lashing back, easily infiltrating that brazen, intelligent asshole's computer system.

However, as soon as he had entered, he had been pushed away by the ghosted computer's firewall and was expelled back into his own system where he was once again attacked. Spamming pictures of the famous spiced ham—SPAM— all over his monitors, that brazen, intelligent asshole locked two of his monitors to YouTube videos of adorable animals doing adorable things.

Zexion growled in an inhuman frustration and unlocked his monitors, returning all the spam back to the computer of origin. And as soon as he had sent something after it, just to scout where it was, it, too, was locked out by a hosted computer's firewall. His adversary was attacking him with other people's computers, other people's well defended computers.

And not even a full breath after that, they were at each other's throats again, trying to steal and re-steal information, spamming pictures, writing advanced viruses, sending Trojans, releasing worms, and zipping it all up and scattering it across the internet. If it had been a physical battle, many people would have been engulfed by fire in sheer awe of the ability and speed of the two at war. It was surreal.

Then it was over.

An assumed draw, because neither retreated, and neither attacked further.

Their battle lasted ten minutes.

_You're really good._

Zexion blinked. Was he being rewarded for fending off his attacker?

_I'm sorry I stole your life._

Zexion blinked again. This didn't feel right. After such a malicious an unwarranted slap in the face, he wasn't going to forgive so easily. He was being set up again. But this time, he was going to catch them. He enacted a keystroke log as he battered the brazen, intelligent asshole back to whatever ghosted computer he was using, locking all the previously used IP addresses from entering his system.

But, his keystroke log had been deactivated as he slammed the door shut on his adversary and blocked him—at least for now—behind an impenetrable automated firewall that could be compared to the same one used by the United States Department of Defense. It was only temporary, since even the United States couldn't defend its secrets without a team of hackers as back up just in case their firewalls and virus eating programs couldn't stand alone.

However, when his fingers cooled down, and his monitors returned to normal, there was a single zipped file sitting on his desktop. It was labeled: The Grey Hat. Zexion smiled, realizing almost at once that the hacker's name was either a play off his own—which was The Black Hat—or a play on his chosen position in the computer underground.

White Hats were hackers paid by companies to test the safety of their systems. They never broke the laws, and only hacked for benevolent purposes. Black Hats were the opposite. They stole information—like credit card numbers, personal email addresses, bank account information, and social security numbers—they were everything that the public feared in a hacker embodied in a single human being who only wished to destroy for profit. And then there were Grey Hats.

Like how life is supposedly in black and white and shades of grey, Grey Hats were hackers who could lean either way. Sometimes they would hack systems, tell the administrators that they had broken in, and then offer to fix their holes for a fee. Or they could lean into the Black Hat realm, and just attack anybody they saw fit for profit, or just for fun. It was almost like they had the best of both worlds, except one had stuck his nose where it didn't belong.

Zexion relaxed that night, though. His job had called him with a "dire emergency requiring your immediate attention", so Zexion had to shut his beloved computer down for the night and trek into the law firm he assisted an IT at, and reconfigure their entire system before the morning. All for a measly salary that minimum wage could sit on with ease.

Hacking was so much more profitable.

And when he flopped into bed and closed his eyes, he didn't hear the beeping of a computer in distress, he didn't hear the alarms of infiltration, and he didn't feel his soul being sucked away by The Grey Hat. But he _did_ have a curiously vivid dream.

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><p>He was sitting in a chair at a local Starbucks with a tall caramel-frappe-whatever-it's-called and his fastest laptop. It was a normal day. The sun was shining and glinting off the freshly washed windows of taller buildings. Birds were trilling in the distance, nesting in trees that were greener than they had been in a while. Cars were passing, offering tinted chrome rainbows on the walls of the coffee shop.<p>

And Zexion was sipping his coffee.

It tasted a little bitter because the waitress had not been listening when he asked for extra sugar, so she didn't put in the extra scoop even though the whole café had heard his order: a tall caramel frappe-whatever-it's-called…extra sugar. And the employees bumbled around while the gangly teenage cashier tried to make small talk.

He was sitting in a comfy chair. It was red, and made of some cheap fabric that was nice enough to look posh and expensive, but was actually a poly blend that was easy to keep clean. People were standing in an increasingly elongating line, while others sat in tall bar-stool style chairs, reading text messages, typing Word documents, and updated their Facebook pages fifty thousand times.

"Do you mind if I sit here?"

Zexion looked up from his own computer to see a woman standing with a messenger bag that featured some cartoon character from the sixties. Her hair, an unruly auburn, was under a hideous green and black hat with "Taquitos!" branded across the front in obnoxious purple text. Her attire was straight out of a fashion magazine, but the starling contrast between her high fashion clothing and her ugly Hot Topic-esque hat made her seem extra desperate for a seat.

"No problem," Zexion said, waving his hand lazily.

"I'm sorry," the girl said. "I've got a class down the street, and it just got cancelled. I'm Ruby."

Zexion snorted. "That's your actual name?"

"Yes."

"That's a stupid name."

Ruby, though offended slightly did not stop smiling at him. Zexion regretted allowing this discombobulated teenager to sit next to him, but his regret was quelled when she pulled out her own laptop—a sleek ASUS—and plugged in a Sprint USB modem.

His target had been acquired, but when he set himself to piggy-backing her internet, he felt this crawling sensation in his arms. It weaved in and out of his fingers, freezing them in place over his keyboard and a temperamental fear washed over him. He suddenly was afraid of this woman.

And when he tried to move his fingers, he found that he could not. He could not get them to budge an inch. Everything around him continued to move. People were still talking and drinking coffee, cars still rolled by, the birds were still trilling. But he had frozen in time. That fear stayed over him until the woman—Ruby—had finished her work, shut down her computer, closed the lid and shoved it back into her messenger bag before rushing off to wherever it was she needed to be when she wasn't in a class, or sitting in a Starbucks.

It was eerie how that unidentifiable fear ebbed away as soon as Ruby had disappeared within the crowd of people who were out at the time. Though he could still sense her obnoxious hat, and he was overcome with fear again. He was definitely afraid of her. But his mind jumped into a train of rational thinking. Was it the hat he was afraid of?

No, it couldn't be. Even though it was a horrendous thing and could be a very easily be a valid fear for anyone, the hat was not nearly as scary as the woman herself. There was something so wrong with her that just didn't sit right in Zexion's brain. And when he dwelled on her, that fear—and a new wave of nausea—came back. Yep, he was definitely afraid of that woman.

But, who was she?

When he woke up, he was sweating profusely.

Obviously, the mystery of who The Grey Hat was was weighing heavily on his mind. It had seeped into his subconscious, which had then triggered an immediate response, which was the cold sweat and the subconscious _need _to find this person in real life. And so began that initial obsession.

And a dumpster dive into an endless pit of insanity.

All in ones and zeros.

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><p><strong>I promise, no more unrelated rants at the beginning of my chapters. It's just been bothering me lately. Sorry.<strong>

**Has a nice day. :D**


	3. Partner? Partner

**Hello, all. Haji here with another chapter. I know, I know, I've made a huge mistake last chapter, and I had hoped that I had fixed it without anybody thinking I'm a complete idiot. Just in case if you missed it, I'm going to point it out, only because it makes me feel better when I admit that I'm wrong.**

**500x100=50,000.**

**That's it.**

**I misread the number of zeros in my head. Sorry. :V**

**Enjoy.**

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><p>"Demyx?"<p>

Zexion, after slaving over the thought of foolishly opening a possibly hazardous file on his desktop, had stopped by his preferred computer store in order to visit Demyx. His plan—which had been in development after another week's worth of personal attacks by The Grey Hat—was to gauge how much his friend knew about the lord of all things silicon, and was going to do so by being terribly and conspicuously blunt (as opposed to being sneaky, which was much harder).

"Yes, Zexion?"

"I'm going to ask you a couple of questions."

Demyx, who had been leaning over the sales counter reading a magazine, threw it to the side and folded his hands under his chin in mock interest. "You are?"

Zexion scowled briefly, knowing full well that Demyx was mocking him, no doubt due to the fact that he had been completely ignored and abandoned for the past week. During that warp through time and paranoia, Zexion had encountered The Grey Hat at least twice a day. Everything that Zexion did, even if it was for work, was thrown around the world in a spiral of confusing code holes and spit back out into a pile of corrupted and unusable mess. Zexion, after fruitlessly trying to defend himself, deduced after the third day of harassment that The Grey Hat was not one, but two very brazen and intelligent assholes.

And, if Zexion was going to have a chance, whether it be a chance in Hell or otherwise, he had to have a partner. A partner he could trust. Manipulate.

Which is why he was sitting in his preferred computer store. Demyx, though slightly unorthodox in his approaches to situations, meaning the complete mockery of them, was a perfect candidate. He may not have _understood _what the many many things around him were, but he at least knew _what _they were which would make mentoring him much easier.

"Would you like to be my partner?"

Demyx instantly perked up, forgetting that he was supposed to be angry. "Oh, for what?"

"Just answer the questions."

"Yes."

"Would you be willing to devote your life to me for an unspecified amount of time?"

"Yessir."

"Are you willing to learn?"

"Anything you want, buddy."

"Would you like to come to my place later tonight? I have something to show you."

Demyx, upon realizing that he may have done something incredibly stupid, closed his mouth. His excitement ebbed away for a short moment as he arched a suggestive eyebrow. "Why are you suddenly inviting me over to your place? I've been asking for years to hang out _at your place. _But you had always insisted on mine. Why the sudden change of heart?"

Zexion blinked slowly. He wasn't going to admit his secret to Demyx in the store. If he did, and some idiot walked in, then his whole operation would be busted, and cops were not on his agenda until after he hunted down and fucked over The Grey Hat.

"You wouldn't believe it if I told you," Zexion said simply. "You have to see it. I'll write the address down for you. I want you there at six o'clock sharp. If you're even a minute late, you can forget it."

Demyx sighed. "Okay, Mr. Bossy. I'll be there early."

Zexion smiled. "Okay, then. I'll see you later. I have to go explain to my boss why I don't have his code written."

Demyx smiled back. "And why don't you?"

"You'll see."

As soon as Zexion left his preferred computer store, he trudged all the way to the law firm he worked for. As far as law firms went, it was very comfortable, considering that people went there for two main reasons—to sue somebody, or to get sued themselves—both of which were harrowing and time consuming tasks. So perhaps the comfortable chairs and the plush carpeting were just an ironic accent for an otherwise hardened place. But Zexion had to ignore the karma-tempting setup and get to his boss.

The lawyers weren't fun, or even friendly. Maybe the nicest person there was Zexion himself, and he was a rather bitter fuck in his own opinion. Stealing and whatnot from the innocent just for his own enjoyment. But his boss was worse. An overly ambitious, annoying simpleton, who wanted to do everything his way, or grumble under his breath in that obvious way people do until he got what he wanted. He was just a masculine cheerleader, parading his craft like it was better than everyone else.

And it was, it's just his boss was such an idiot, he made IT experts and computer programmers seem like douchebags.

"What do you mean your files got "corrupted"?"

"It's exactly what it sounds like."

Zexion's boss, who everyone called Frank, but whose name was actually Anthony, leaned back in his fancy rolling chair in his office looking very peeved. Apparently, Zexion's assignment had been _very_ important. Almost as important as the golf game that the head lawyer at the firm had to get to after he was presented with the stunning idea that Frank, aka Anthony (meaning Zexion) had come up with in order to make filing electronically much more user friendly.

But since The Grey Hat was trolling Zexion's life, his big project had turned into a virus breeding ground—though under normal circumstances Zexion would have released it upon the unsuspecting lawyers with God complexes—and he had to pretend that he had fucked up. Which he did.

"Do something about it," Frank spat.

"I will."

"No, I mean, right now." Frank stood up, his narcissism and asshole-ish-ness disappearing in an instant. "They are going to start the meeting in a few hours."

"It took me days to write the program," Zexion said smoothly. "They are not going to get anything halfway decent if I try to think of something in a few hours. You'll just have to tell them what happened."

"What do I say, huh?" Frank asked, fuming. "Oh, I'm sorry, my idiotic assistant accidently destroyed and corrupted his own files so we can't have it to you until next week?"

Zexion shrugged. "If that's what it takes."

"Well, here's a little something for you." Frank went to one of the many crowded bookshelves that occupied his office and plucked a few off the bottom shelf. He slammed the books on his desk and leaned in Zexion's face, breathing his anger into Zexion like it was some kind of communicable disease. "You figure out how to put something together…or you're fired."

Zexion looked at the books and arched an eyebrow. Before him were three computer manuals detailing HTML, C++, and PASCAL. All useless information for him, since he already had and read those books a million times. And Frank's anger was starting to get to him, which meant only one real outcome could have possibly come from this.

Zexion leaned over Frank's desk and smirked. "Well, I suggest you get crackin' on that flowchart of yours. I quit."

And before Frank, aka Anthony could say anything; before anybody could say anything, Zexion spun around on his heels, whisked into his office, cleared out only the important things he needed to keep, and left the law firm without another word.

He never looked back.

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><p>"Oh my god, Zexion," Demyx cried as he stepped over the threshold of his friend's apartment at exactly six o'clock. "Your house is so…cool!"<p>

Zexion frowned. "I'm glad you like it."

"No," Demyx corrected. "I mean cool as in freezing. Why do you have the air conditioning on?"

"Oh." Zexion sipped his Dr. Pepper and led Demyx to his living room. "Follow me."

As Demyx followed Zexion, he noticed quite a few peculiar things about the apartment, the first and foremost being that the walls were lined with what looked like some kind of advanced air filtration system. The screens were intricate, with a thin film of dust, but they looked as if they had been recently cleaned. And they made this soft buzzing sound that reminded Demyx very much of those movies where people trap the unsuspecting traveler in a scary dungeon room and then carve them up for breakfast in the morning. All while laughing maniacally.

But, Zexion was no killer, right? He was too small.

"Stop gawking at everything," Zexion said after a brief period of silence. "I know what you're thinking."

Demyx blushed. "How did you…?"

"We've been friends for what? Eight years now?" Zexion asked. "I know when you're letting your imagination run wild. I'm not a serial killer."

"What are these things?" Demyx pointed to the slightly dusty screens in the walls. "You're not going to poison me, are you?"

"Seriously, you need to stop watching science-fiction movies. I mean it."

Demyx was silent.

"It's a filtration system that sucks out all the moisture, dust, hair, and bacteria from the air in the house," Zexion explained. "It's for my computers."

"Computers? As in more than one?"

"Yes."

As Demyx made his way into the living room, his eyes grew wide at the sight of the plasmas. Each one had a different program running, and Zexion was drifting from one to the other, Dr. Pepper in hand, typing various things into each one. Demyx nearly fainted with the realization that his best friend, though quiet and sometimes a bit rude, was undoubtedly a secret stock broker who was probably unfathomably rich.

"I knew it!"

Zexion blinked. "Knew what?"

"You really are a stock broker."

Zexion clenched the hand that was not currently keeping a Dr. Pepper dangerously close to his lips. "Stop making assumptions about me. It really is annoying. I'm not a stock broker."

"That explains why you are always buying computer stuff," Demyx said, completely ignoring Zexion's protest. "You are running an investment firm from your house. And in order to keep track of everything, you need better computers. It all makes sense now."

Zexion rolled his eyes and sat down in a chair. He motioned for Demyx to do the same, but he had already lost him. Demyx was spewing out assumption after assumption while pacing Zexion's living room, and though Zexion found it mildly annoying that he had not yet stopped, he didn't say anything until Demyx was done, which was awfully polite of him, but also wasted about five minutes of his life.

"Are you done?"

Demyx nodded and sat down. "Too bad I'm not into the stock market, otherwise you and I could make a killing."

"I'm not a stock broker."

Demyx's phone buzzed and he silenced it, taking on serious tone because he was sure that Zexion was about to show him something awesome. "So, what are you then? Because I'm not buying the assistant IT thing anymore."

"I'm not that either," Zexion remarked, half amused. "I quit today."

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be. Frank was an asshole."

Demyx smiled, still clearly sympathetic. "So, what are you?"

Zexion sighed and grabbed one of the numerous wireless mice that still littered the floor. "Why don't I just show you? What do you think the most impossible thing to do right now is?"

"Change my dismal high school grades so I can get a better job."

"How about something a little more exciting? Changing grades is boring. Only teenagers do that kind of shit."

Demyx thought for a second. "Un-defaulting my bank loans? Fixing my horrid credit score?"

"Think bigger."

"Uh…I don't know!" Demyx quickly grew frustrated, and he jumped to his feet because he was a little pissed off that Zexion was being cryptic. More so than usual, which was already kind of difficult to deal with in the first place. "Change the time for the Superbowl or something. Or make it so that every station on TV is turned to Rachel Ray."

"Well, the Superbowl isn't for a little while, so how about a double dose of Rachel Ray for the cable company?" Zexion smiled, getting filled with that chaotic mayhem he liked to create, and some incredibly hot fingers. "Sit down. I'll make your wish come true."

"That almost sounded like you were making a joke," Demyx pointed out.

Zexion grimaced. "I wasn't. Just watch."

Demyx, though dimly aware of what was actually happening, was amazed when things started popping up on some of the plasma screens. He recognized some of the things that were happening—the flying through websites, the writing of some codes that he remembered from high school—but that was just about it. He only recognized some. When the screen morphed into an entire digital interface for the local cable company, he was utterly lost, but maybe ten times more amazed.

"What are you…?"

"Shh!"

Demyx quieted and watched in awe as Zexion typed letters faster than he could think. One of the screens farthest away from where Zexion worked started flipping through channels one at a time until—eventually—Rachel Ray was on every single one. Even the cartoon channels, sports channels, movie channels, porn channels. It was scary.

"Did you see what I just did?"

"Zexion." Demyx paused. "You're a genius?"

"Well, maybe not genius."

"How did you do that?"

"Do you really want to know, or are you just asking a rhetorical question?"

Demyx smiled. "I really want to know."

Zexion thumbed his chin. "Well, how can I explain this simply? Most of the cable companies today have gone at least partially—if not all—digital. That means that they are probably connected to the internet, or they have some kind of Wi-Fi. That means that there is a back door somewhere, where a malicious person can come in and wreak havoc."

"But, you're not malicious, are you?" Demyx asked. "You're just doing this for fun. As a joke."

Zexion, who was almost about correct him, but upon realizing that that would be a very stupid and unwise thing to do, nodded his head, and adorned this unusual shyness in his answer. A shyness that should have immediately clued Demyx in to the fact that he was lying through his teeth. But Demyx, who trusted his friends beyond a shadow of a doubt, did not catch this small, seemingly insignificant gesture, and took Zexion's answer straight.

"Uh…yeah, sure."

Demyx smiled. "So, you're going to fix it, right?"

"Yeah, as soon as her show is over, the original programming will continue."

Demyx waited patiently for about thirty minutes, and sure enough, the original programming did continue just as Zexion had promised. Zexion, though itching to get to the real reason for his sudden invitation, remained still while he waited for Demyx's excitement to fade a little. Though, he had to admit, in his own arrogant way, that he was a little bit of a genius.

"That was so cool," Demyx said as Rachel Ray flickered off and an episode of Spongebob Squarepants resumed. "I mean, cooler than cool."

"Thank you," Zexion said. "I'm glad you think it's cool, but it gets complicated from this point on."

"What do you mean?"

Zexion stood and motioned for Demyx to follow. Demyx really wanted to stay and watch Spongebob, but the dark look on Zexion's face told him that what was about to happen was very important, probably very frightening as well, for it was a rare occasion for Zexion to have such a look of helplessness.

Zexion opened the door to the room farthest back from the living room. In the corner, all made up, was his bed. The rest of the room was occupied by his brand new computer, which was connected to at least six screens. Half the screens were black, probably victims of The Grey Hat, while the others seemed to be writing their own computer codes to make sure Zexion's files were safe while he was away.

"I've been under attack for the past couple of weeks," Zexion said finally. "I've been targeted by a hacker named The Grey Hat, who wants to completely destroy me, and has been stealing files from me."

"You mean a troll?"

Zexion huffed. "Fine, a troll. Whatever you want to call him…them."

"Them?" Demyx asked.

"I figured out recently that there are at least two different hackers operating together under the same name. And they really hate me."

Zexion tapped his mouse, and his computer whirred into action from its idle computing. The screens that were still functioning grew brighter, and a load of SPAM pictures were tossed all over the desktop. Zexion's computer battered them away and sent them elsewhere in the depths of the internet.

"Ordinarily, I would have never stooped so low as to ask for the assistance of anybody, but I need your help," Zexion explained. Demyx wasn't sure, but he actually sounded a little desperate. "But, I need a partner I can trust. These assholes stole my life. They are stepping into my territory, and I can't for the life of me, figure out who they are."

"You want me to help you?"

"Yes."

"In your cyber warfare thing?"

"It's not a war," Zexion said. "I'm not a terrorist. I just want to find out who they are, that's all."

Demyx nodded thoughtfully. "That's all well and good, but I barely know anything about programming. I mean, I could _maybe_ remember a little bit from a HTML class I had in high school, but I could never do what you just did."

"Well, I'd be teaching you."

"But, it's like learning a foreign language."

"Yes, but I'm a good teacher, and you could pick up on it fairly easily if you focus."

"But, it's hard," Demyx whined.

"I'll compensate you for your services," Zexion promised. "Please, I can't ask anybody else. You know some stuff about computers already, you just don't understand it. I'll help you understand."

"And then we'll squash these Grey Hat guys?"

"Yes."

Demyx thought for a moment. Would he really want to do that though—help his best friend destroy the life of a person (or persons)—just for revenge? No, he couldn't. But he could at least help him figure out who those mysterious trolls were. And then even think of an effective way to beat them without trashing the internet and every computer connected to it for thousands of miles in every direction.

"So, will you help me?"

Demyx frowned. "Do I get a hacker name too?"

Zexion had not been expecting him to ask that, or even refer to it as hacking (even though that's what it was). He was actually expecting a much less serious question. Something along the lines of the normal Demyx. But, he was pleasantly surprised that he answered without thinking.

"As soon as you learn it well."

"What, hacking?"

"Don't call it that."

"That's what it is."

"That's not the point."

Demyx puffed out his chest. "I accept the challenge."

Zexion sat at his computer and looked at Demyx through newer (more manipulative) eyes. "Don't get ahead of yourself. "You have a lot to learn."

And that was the beginning of their true friendship. Because Demyx had only been a long-time (unwanted) friend before, Zexion never had the same respect for him, but now things were different. Things would get better as soon as Demyx focused long enough to learn a new craft. And that would be simple enough for a great hacker like Zexion, right?

Right?

* * *

><p><strong>That right there was a curve ball, yes? I wanted to go a little less sociopathic but still destructive with Zexion this time around. Notice that he was more open and willing to search for help, even though he still doesn't want it. And he is more willing to accept a friendship even though it took him eight years to get to the point.<strong>

**You gotta love Zexion. He's my favorite, only because I can identify with him better than anybody else in the game…**

**Has a nice day. :D**


	4. The University

**Hello all. Haji here with another lovely chapter for you. And an apology. I'm so sorry that I haven't been updating as often as I would like. Life is life is life and it gets in your face sometimes. I appreciate all your patience, for as I'm sure you know by now…college eats your soul.**

**So, after a really long time (I'm not going to look at the number of weeks) I present Chapter 4. I wish I could say that I have a definitive writing schedule right now, but I do not. I will work on one chapter of one story at a time in between my writing classes. And when it is my turn to write a chapter of A World that Never Was, that will be taking a majority of my time.**

**As for those of you who read A World That Never Was, DeadShut and I are still working diligently as always, but it seems that the writer's block is spreading. I'm sure he would apologize as well, but that's not really up to me now is it?**

**Hurr.**

**Enjoy.**

* * *

><p>"You are so completely hopeless!"<p>

Demyx ground his teeth together after his third attempt at breaking into Zexion's "dummy" computer. Zexion had been sitting next to him, sipping his Dr. Pepper like a boss, as he was flailing about like an idiot.

"It's too hard!" Demyx roared.

Zexion hummed thoughtfully. "They say the hardest things in life are the things most worthwhile."

"Don't you get philosophical with me, tiny man," Demyx growled.

Zexion sighed and stopped the exercise he had set up on his dummy computer. Demyx leaned away from the keyboard set before him and stood up. He stretched upwards and an audible clicking echoed slightly over the whirrs of the sleeping computer monitors. Stiff couldn't touch what his body was feeling.

"How about we go get some coffee?" Zexion asked after Demyx seemed to simmer down. "I want to teach you something. Maybe this will help you better understand what it is you have to do."

Demyx folded his arms. "I don't think I want to do this for you anymore. I'm not very smart as far as this is concerned…you know, your hacking."

"Stop calling it that," Zexion hissed.

"I mean 'exploitation'," Demyx corrected. He defiantly used air quotes just to get under Zexion's skin, though he wasn't sure how effective it was. "Anyway, I'm not as smart as you, and I only remember a little bit from a HTML class I had a long time ago. Nothing that could help you."

Zexion blinked. He couldn't let Demyx walk away knowing his secret. Though Demyx didn't know that he was a serious hacker, he would figure it out eventually, and Zexion couldn't have that little bit of dirty laundry floating around anywhere. He had to teach Demyx.

And maybe a different approach would work. Something that Demyx could grasp a little more easily. Something like a movie.

When Zexion closed and locked his apartment door behind him, Demyx shuddered.

"The temperature change is astounding," Demyx whispered. "My god, it feels like summer out here."

Zexion grunted and headed down the street to his favorite coffee shop. Demyx tried to stay a little behind him, but every time he fell too far behind, Zexion turned around to make sure he hadn't fled.

"I think I'm taking this teaching thing the wrong way," Zexion said after a minute of silence. "You are not my kind of smart, Demyx. You take things in a little differently, and I've been trying to cram my methods into your head." He glanced at Demyx, slightly irritated, and sighed. "Obviously, it isn't working.

"So, I have an idea that might help you grasp this concept a little better. And in order to do that, you need to learn about people. Real people."

"Okay."

Zexion opened the door to the coffee shop—Café Lotto it was called—and ushered Demyx in.

"Oh, it smells good in here," he said enthusiastically.

"We're not here to goof off," Zexion replied. "I'm here for coffee, you're here to learn."

"Will you at least pay for me?"

Zexion didn't answer, but ordered two coffees—both with extra sugar—when asked by the clerk and sat down in the farthest corner in a comfortable arm chair. Demyx sat across from him, and when he sipped his coffee, he grimaced.

"This is disgusting." Demyx put his cup on a side table. "Why is it so sweet?"

"Because it is."

Zexion stared at Demyx for a long time, contemplating his next move. He honestly had no idea how he was going hash out an entire new teaching process on such short notice. Demyx was so unfocused, it was scary.

"We're going to play a game."

Demyx grinned. "I love games."

"I know," Zexion said. "This is a critical thinking game, and it requires you to focus and be quick. Most of the people around here will drink their coffee and leave. They won't hang around for too long."

"Like us?"

"Yeah, like us."

Demyx frowned and sipped his disgusting coffee. Every time the sweet drink passed over his tongue, he would make the same face. A combination of disgust and anticipation. "So, what is this game?"

Zexion laughed as quietly as he could. "I know every regular customer's password. They all bring laptops and sit around on the weekends sometimes. You are going to figure out what they are."

Demyx nearly spit coffee in Zexion's face. "Wait, what? How the fuck am I supposed to do that?"

"You have to learn about them," Zexion said simply. "Figure them out, then create a password as if you were them. It's almost like being a spy."

Demyx's face nearly lit up at the thought that he could pretend to be a spy. After all, he _was_ trying to do something secretive, and he _was_ on a mission. It was an unorthodox mission, but it held that same excitement nonetheless. Zexion scowled at him.

"Don't get too carried away," he warned. "This is an exercise, not a movie. Don't yell at anybody, okay?"

Demyx waved him off. "I got this." He looked around excitedly. "Who am I supposed to be figuring out?"

Zexion sipped his coffee. "You see that woman over there? The one in the plaid coat?"

Demyx turned around as inconspicuously as he could and turned back after spotting the woman—who, indeed, was wearing a plaid coat. With her was a man and a young boy. "Yeah."

"She frequents this shop," Zexion said coolly. "When she sits on her computer, she is usually looking at documents that look formal. What is the password to her email?"

Demyx frowned. "Formal documents? How is that supposed to help?"

"Figure it out."

"Well," Demyx paused and placed his cup back on a side table. "I guess she would be some kind if lawyer, right? Or a government worker?"

Zexion remained silent.

"If she is a lawyer, then she's not a good one, because who looks at private documents out in public? Unless if she's a government worker, but then she also would not be out and about with important documents like that. Maybe she's a writer."

Again, Zexion remained silent.

"Or a librarian," Demyx said quickly, losing his cool. He shook visibly, straining his brain to think about something he had no idea about. "Man, I don't know. How am I supposed to figure out who she is? I have no clue."

Zexion stayed silent for a moment longer, waiting for Demyx to quiet himself. Demyx stared at him, eyes burning with confusion and distain. He didn't want to do this anymore. It was too difficult.

"You were close with the government official," said Zexion quietly. "She works for the Internal Revenue Service."

"She's a tax collector?"

"The documents she looks at are memos from her supervisors, Dan Herten and David Langer."

"But—"

"What else do you know about her?"

"She has a husband and a son?"

Zexion hummed. "Pay a little closer attention, my friend."

Demyx turned around again and stared at the woman. She seemed nice enough. She was smiling, and she held onto the boy's hand and she was speaking softly. He could see she was a genuinely good person; not a malignant bone in her body. But he stared at her longer—always making sure to avert his eyes whenever she looked at him suspiciously—and he saw that there was no glimmer of a diamond on her hand.

"She's not married."

Zexion chuckled. "And?"

Demyx glanced at the boy. He was clinging to her protectively, glaring at the man. However, the man seemed unfazed by the child's presence, and only spoke to the woman.

"The child is hers. Then that must be a boyfriend." Demyx paused again and narrowed his eyes. "But I don't think the kid likes him too much."

Zexion smiled.

"The relationship won't last long," Demyx added offhandedly.

"Guess again," Zexion mused. "They've been together for three years."

"I don't want to play this game anymore."

"What's her password?"

Demyx folded his arms. "I don't know. You're not funny, you know that, right?"

"What's her password?"

"Something stupid, I'm sure."

Zexion arched an eyebrow. "What's her password, superspy?"

"Whatever her son's name is."

"Which is?"

Demyx frowned and perked his ears. He closed his eyes slowly, and focused on what the woman was saying. She was sitting three seats away, and the coffee shop started buzzing with business so it became a little difficult to hear her.

"Jordyn," Demyx said after a while.

"It's not long enough."

"Jordyn…one…two…three?"

"Try again."

Demyx sighed. He was starting to get a headache trying to wrap his brain around guessing what other people were going to do. Or what they had already done. It was mindboggling how easily this came to Zexion, especially since he did this on a regular basis. Apparently, he had the key to other people's lives, and they weren't even aware of it.

"You see, Demyx," Zexion mused, "people do one of two things when they create a password. They either choose something stupid like password, qwerty, or abc123, or they use a name of somebody they love and add the year they were born after it. Usually only the last two numbers."

"So, it would be Jordyn…zero five?"

"Zero six, actually."

Demyx swallowed. "How did—"

Zexion stood up. "Come. You have much to learn. You still need to read people better, but you cracked the password on the first go. I'm impressed."

"Thank you?"

"Don't thank me yet. Now we must work on your speed. And then…your dismal coding skills. Let's go."

"Where are we going?"

"College."

* * *

><p>When going to a university, one might suspect that the only thing worth going for is the legendary frat parties, the hottest men and women, and some of the sharpest brains that the respective state had to offer. Deep within the lowest social circles laid the computer programmers. The "nerdy" type. However, this is not where the best programmers existed. No, they lived at the top of the food chain, hiding amongst the other alumni with majors they didn't care for. They were flawlessly camouflaged.<p>

"You're going to work your way through the ranks of the university," Zexion said, knocking on the door of a fraternity house.

"I'm going to what now?"

Zexion bowed respectfully to the person who opened the door, a round-faced teen, and entered without another word. Demyx followed quickly, copying Zexion's gestures by bowing his head. The round-faced teen arched an eyebrow and closed the door quickly behind them.

"I've come to ask the lowest spawn for help," Zexion told the round-faced teen. "I know you guys are some of the better coders around, but I need the best."

The round-faced teen scoffed. "Who do you think you are? You can't just walk in here demanding shit."

Zexion sighed softly. "You must be a new recruit."

"What the fuck do you want?"

"Is there a story around here about a guy called "The Graduate" by any chance?"

The round-faced teen tensed up. "Uh, yeah. It's the story of one guy who erased the entire school's servers one semester. Everybody was given an automatic C. I heard the story, what of it?"

"I don't think your higher ups would like to hear about you disrespecting people you don't know."

"Fuck off!"

"Hey! What's going on down here?" A taller man who looked like he was in his early twenties jumped down the stairs with a bat in hand.

Zexion turned to this man. "I'm requesting assistance, and your new bitch is being an asshole to someone he doesn't know."

The man's eyes widened. "What? To you?" He turned to the round-faced teen. "Are you a fucking dead man?"

"No…"

"Well you will be if you don't get on your knees and beg for forgiveness! Do you want The Graduate to come and kick your ass?"

"This guy, he's not one of us!"

"God damnit, Brett! Shut the fuck up. You're cleaning toilets today, pansy. Get lost."

Demyx looked at Zexion, who had a slightly amused grin on his face. "Are you The Graduate?"

Zexion nodded. "And before you say anything, no, it's not a reference to the movie."

"Damn…"

"Sorry about that idiot." The man placed the bat on a small table and shook Zexion's hand, and then Demyx's. "My name is Brody. And, I'm honored that The Graduate still recognizes us as a bunch of lowly spawn. What can I help you with?"

Zexion folded his arms. "He needs to learn how to code beautifully. I want him to work his way up in the ranks. You need to break him."

Brody glanced at Demyx. "What's wrong? He doesn't have a C average, does he?"

Zexion grunted. "Worse. He can't focus."

"Fuck me, man."

Demyx frowned. "Hey, I'm standing right here, you know."

Zexion ignored him. "I need him primed as soon as possible."

Brody fidgeted. "I don't know. If he can't focus, it might take years."

"I'll give you six months."

"That's not long enough," Brody said. "I'd need more time."

Zexion looked at Demyx. "According to him, he's not as smart as I am. He's probably thinking he's about half as smart. Therefore, he gets twice as much time."

"But six months?"

Zexion smirked. "I did it in three."

For a long time, Zexion and Brody were silent. They stared at each other, trying to force a better deal through slightly narrowed eyes. It looked like neither one was going to budge too much, until Brody took a step back and bowed to Zexion.

"As you wish." He glanced at Demyx, who paled under his eyes. "He sleeps in the bitch's den. We would treat him as one of our own."

"I'd expect nothing less."

"He'll have to be initiated."

"No problem."

"But, he's not in the school's system."

Zexion chuckled. "Like I said…no problem."

Demyx was putting two and two together much faster now that his fate had already been decided. Zexion's cryptic way of talking was becoming painfully clear. And Demyx didn't like what he was hearing.

"Now wait just a minute!" he said, suddenly scared and agitated. "I am not going to live here. I have a job and a life."

Zexion looked at him. "Remember when I asked you if you would devote your life to me for an unspecified amount of time?"

"Yeah, but—"

"I told you that you would be well compensated for it, did I not?"

"Yeah, but—"

"You are going to work your way up the computer programmer's food chain," Zexion said simply. "Your final assignment will be handed to you when you are ready. I'll see you in six months."

Demyx jumped. "Wait, you're not seriously going to leave me here, are you?"

Zexion turned away. Brody grabbed the bat off the table and wielded it like a sword, pointing it at Demyx like he was threatening him. Despite his fear of being left in such an unfamiliar place, when he tried to follow Zexion and Brody ushered him back, he leaned away from the wooden weapon.

"Hey! Come back!"

Zexion ignored him. "You can do whatever you like, Brody. You'll receive payment as soon as he passes through. Go hard on him."

"You're a rotten friend, Zexion, you know that?"

Zexion hummed. "Yes, I do. I'll see you in six months."

And he walked out the door.

* * *

><p>After about three days into the "intensive training", Demyx was already sick of college. "I had already done this once." were his exact words and he tried everything in his power to escape, though he gave up rather easily. Especially since his first attempt had landed his head in a toilet, and his image permanently ridiculed forevermore by the seniors of the university.<p>

The first lesson went exactly the same way.

"Attention, bitches!" Brody called.

Demyx was sitting with about six other people, all younger than he was and very very anxious. He was probably the most scared out of all of them, for he still held onto the initial anger of being completely abandoned by someone who he thought was his best friend.

Brody paced around them, placing laptops in front of each person. The laptops looked fairly new, but they had all been informed that they were "shit computers" meaning that they were all used for training the bitches.

"Okay, this is how this is going to work," Brody started. "You have each been given a shit computer for your shit. This computer will be your only weapon in a war within the fraternity. Delta Epsilon Alpha has two main branches. Who wants to explain to DemBitch what they are?"

Demyx was only vaguely aware that Brody was referring to him. The teen sitting next to him raised his hand.

"Brody recognizes ScottBitch for the answer."

ScottBitch—whose name Demyx was guessing was Scott—looked at him and puffed out his chest like a snob.

"The two branches of Delta Epsilon Alpha are the Black Hats, who are the most advanced programmers in the fraternity, and the White Hats, who are the idiots."

"Or the bitches," Brody finished. "You are all White Hats. We hate you all. And your job is to infiltrate us and destroy our systems. We will attempt to do the same to you. The only rule in this war is no cheating. Which means no asking any higher ups to write code for you."

Demyx looked around. "How are we supposed to do that if we don't know any code?"

Everyone in the circle laughed at him. Brody joined them before becoming serious again. He pointed his bat at Demyx and then motioned to a bookshelf that sat across from him.

"I suggest you get to reading, DemBitch. The war starts at exactly midnight. And there is no telling when the Black Hats will strike."

Demyx swallowed and stood up, his laptop tucked under his arm. He had a lot of worrying to do now. He was the only one on the team who didn't know a lick of code with the exception of _a__little_bit of HTML from a high school class he had a long time ago. He trudged over to the bookshelf, plucked a book off the middle shelf, sat in the corner with his laptop turned on, and began studying.

As midnight struck, he had not gone to sleep. He stayed up, typing in codes into a Word document. He was slow and tedious, and when he finished a small script, he tested it out with a program that had been installed on his laptop by Brody. It ran like a clunky machine, and all the tests that had been run on it by the computer's server, failed.

He glared at his screen.

After a few minutes, it began to blink. Then a picture popped up. It was a picture of the famed spiced ham, SPAM. After a second, another picture popped up and then another in quick succession. Then a dialog box popped up.

"What the—?"

_How are you doing today, script kiddie?_

Demyx frowned and looked at his keyboard. Words were appearing in front of him, but he wasn't typing them himself. He must have been struck by the Black Hats within the fraternity. He resisted the urge to force his computer to shut off. After all, this person hadn't really done anything except maybe insult him and even then he wasn't sure of that.

He leaned forward and started writing back:

_Y R U Trolling my best friend?_

_Because, my dear script kiddie, he doesn't deserve everything he has._

_Y do U get to choose that?_

_Because I do…_

Demyx frowned. He wanted to type something witty back, but he was facing a troll on his own. The Grey Hat. It had to be him. Or them if both of them were attacking him at the same time. He was suddenly scared, and wanted to protect his and Zexion's honor. For a brief moment, he berated himself for sounding like a knight from the Dark Ages in a movie, but he cracked a smile.

_Take your time, script kiddie. I have all night to taunt you._

_Go away._

_Oh, am I annoying you?_

_To be honest, yes._

_Fine. Let's play, shall we? I'll even let you use your book. Your coding is weak._

Demyx flipped through his book, typing in codes that he was figuring them out. He tried to lock The Grey Hat out, but as he was halfway through inputting his commands, The Grey Hat took control of his computer and fixed his coding. It reversed itself, and wouldn't take any of the keyboard commands Demyx attempted to put in.

_You see how I cut away all the useless code? You see how it's air tight now? You spend too much time trying to perfect it as you go. Forget all the useless mess, script kiddie._

The Grey Hat pulled up a variety of coding manuals that were nothing like the ones that had been provided for him by the fraternity. They were simpler, spelling things out in ultra laymen's terms. Suddenly, things started making sense.

_I want to play with you, but it won't be fun if you can't fight back. Then I'd be nothing more than a bully._

_A__bully__with__morals?_ That was all Demyx could type back.

For some reason, that was amusing to him. But, the manuals The Grey Hat had given him were priceless. It suddenly became so simple, like using an everyday word processing program. It attributed actions to keys and spelled it out in simple sentences that could easily be remembered and manipulated.

"When in doubt, squeeze it out." became an easy way to trim everything that could be cut away so a code could be read faster, therefore it was faster to break down, therefore it was easier to understand. And then it became easy to replicate.

It took Demyx two months to memorize the manuals.

In the meanwhile, the war between the Black Hats and the White Hats within the fraternity escaladed into something so much more than it should have. Students were losing their work on their personal computers by the terabyte load, grades were being switched around, bewitched into fails, and information was pirated and sold at record speed. Sabotage was not out of the question for either party.

Demyx remained relatively untouched by the Black Hats as he struggled to figure out the computer world on his own. He wanted desperately to call Zexion so he could at least yell a variety of obscenities over the phone before asking for his help. But that would have been considered cheating. He would be asking for help from a designated "higher up" and would be humiliated publicly if he did so. He wasn't too keen on finding out the scope of the Black Hats' imaginations when prompted to go crazy.

His laptop lay on his bed one night, running a virus scan. Demyx had been spending the majority of his time crafting a special program that would generate a virus that would be undetected by a virus scanner. It was meant to change from Trojan to a Worm after the computer had already discovered it to be a Trojan. During the process of removing the threat, it would transform into another program and squeeze through the vulnerable defenses. It was complicated in design, but easy to build. At least it was now, now that he had memorized a manual written in real English.

His computer had detected a Trojan, just like he anticipated, but his program wasn't transforming into a worm. It was being detected and destroyed without an issue. Demyx sighed heavily as his attempt at a virus failed yet again. He looked through the manual The Grey Hat had given him, but could find nothing that could help. Just a bunch of cleverly worded tips.

It's not the direction you go, just the direction you give.

Possibilities are limited to the scope of the imagination; codec can be so much more.

Finding the right code is all about misdirection, and when you think they've got it, divide and conquer.

All meaningless jargon at this point for Demyx. After trying to fix the code again, there was a subtle knock on his door. He had shared the room with Scott and Jeff—ScottBitch and JeffBitch—but they had gone out for the night. Demyx opened the door carefully.

"Yes?"

There was a young woman standing at his door. She had short red hair and she was smiling at him.

"Um, would you mind if I came in?"

"This isn't a trick is it?"

_Stupid__Demyx,_he thought, _when__a__pretty__girl__asks__to__come__in,__you__let__her.__Don__'__t__ask__questions._

"Er…I mean, come in."

Demyx opened his door wider and the young woman eased in. As soon as she went to sit on his bed, he rushed to close the lid of his laptop, which was only showing his failure again. He stared at the woman and tried to form words, but they kept getting stuck in his throat. He had never been very good with girls, not when he was actually in college, not in high school, and not now.

"I just wanted to see how you were doing."

Demyx swallowed. "I'm sorry, I don't actually know who you are."

"Oh, my name is Kairi, and I'm the leader of Delta Epsilon Alpha's sister sorority, Delta Theta Phi." She frowned briefly. "I saw you the first day you came. I saw how they embarrassed you in the courtyard."

"Ah," Demyx said. "You're a senior then?"

"Yes, but I just wanted to see if you were okay. My schedule's been pretty busy, and I usually introduce myself to the new guys within the first week or so."

"Well, I've kinda been staying under the radar so to speak," Demyx admitted in a whisper. "I'm in the middle of a war right now. And females are usually trouble. So, uh…"

Kairi chuckled. "You're not really good at this are you?"

"No, not really."

"Allow me," Kairi said, standing up. "You think I'm here to sabotage you because I'm a 'pretty' girl who has shown interest in introducing myself to you. So now you feel awkward. And I'm making it more obvious by stating it, aren't I?"

Demyx swallowed again. "Yep, that pretty much sums it up."

Kairi giggled. "Do you mind if I look at your laptop?"

Demyx shrugged. "It's a failure anyway. I don't think it even matters at this point."

Kairi pulled his laptop to her and opened the lid. "I think you'd be surprised to know that I'm pretty handy with computers myself."

"Is that right?"

"Yeah, you can't even get into Delta Theta Phi without more advanced computer skills." Kairi paused. "And I'm not talking typing either."

Demyx refused to look at her. If he didn't see her, she wasn't there and maybe a fresh pair of eyes would do him a world of good. After a while, Kairi closed his laptop and placed it back on his bed. She stood up and tapped Demyx on the shoulder.

"Listen, I know you're a scared child right now," she said teasingly, "but you seriously need to rework your coding. It feels like an amateur threw up all over it. So much useless text everywhere."

"Uh…what?" Demyx didn't believe her. He had memorized the manuals that The Grey Hat had given him. His codes were perfect. They had to be.

Kairi laughed at him. "Your coding sucks."

"Gee, thanks."

Kairi laughed again. "It's okay though. You came here to learn, right? I'll teach you if you really want to know."

Demyx frowned. "Well, I thought I had somebody helping me before. It turns out that they were just messing with me."

Kairi blinked slowly. "Oh? Who? Maybe I know them."

"I doubt it," Demyx said quickly. "But, it doesn't matter now. I'm a complete idiot."

"Well, when it comes to hacking, you are," Kairi said finally. "But, give me a few months. I'll teach you well. Better than any of the clowns around here."

"I'd appreciate it," Demyx mumbled.

Kairi smiled. "Great. Training starts tomorrow. I'll see you then!"

As she slipped out the door and down the hall, Demyx smiled. He was going to be taught by one of the best, he knew it. And a pretty girl to boot. He couldn't wait.

That is…until he found out just exactly what she meant by "training".

May God rest his soul.

* * *

><p><strong>Well, it certainly seems that the plot is going somewhere else. I kind of did not intend for this to happen, but you know, those plots can be a bit finicky sometimes. I, however, do like where this is going in terms of the "new future". University is fun, right?<strong>

**It will not stay long, I promise. Be patient…**

**I gotta go type another chapter of…that horrifying Twilight thing…**

**Has a nice day. :D**


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